


Baby Steps

by dustlines



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Canon Temporary Character Death, Episode: s08e10 Torn and Frayed, Hurt Castiel (Supernatural), Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Slash, Season/Series 08
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-26
Updated: 2013-02-26
Packaged: 2020-07-07 18:08:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19856650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustlines/pseuds/dustlines
Summary: They eventually figure out what Naomi's doing to Cas. The question is whether or not they figured things out in time to save him.





	Baby Steps

**Author's Note:**

> **CW** : mentions of blood, side character death (Naomi), brief mention of suicidal ideation (Castiel's).
> 
> **Original Post Date** : 2013.02.26
> 
> **A/N** : Not a personal favorite of mine, but I am transferring all of my old work to AO3 for archival purposes, so it's included in this process. I _believe_ I remember writing this as an alternative way that Dean could have arrived in Heaven to try to free Castiel from Naomi's mind control in season 8, but it's been a while!

* * *

When the dust has cleared and the blood is cooling on Dean's hands, he squints through the bright white of Naomi's office, past the upturned chairs and the broken glass desk, to where Castiel stands motionless against the wall. Castiel's gaze is turned down, his hand shaky as he pulls his sword up through Naomi's slack jaw and then wipes it clean on his sleeve. Her blood leaves an ashy gray smear on his arm when he turns to face Dean, his blue eyes wide and hopeless.  
  
"When can I stop killing?" he spits out through gritted teeth, then chokes on his own pain and doubles over.  
  
Dean springs over to him, over the debris and and shattered glass, opening his arms to Castiel's tight-fisted collapse and the shudders that go through him afterwards.  
  
"C'mon, Cas, we're leaving."  
  
"No." Castiel spits this into Dean's neck like it's a poison or a curse, his breath hot with blood. "Leave me. How many times must I demand death before you let me just—"  
  
"Cas." Dean is furious, feels the anger curling in his gut like a snake: anger that anyone would do this to someone who's just trying to be good, anger that anyone would toy with his best friend's suicidal tendencies to her own advantage, anger that he didn't get here soon enough or fast enough to lessen the blow that seems to be crippling Castiel from the inside-out. "Listen to me straight, right now. You're my _best friend_ , and I _need_ you, and you are _not_ dying in a place like this one."  
  
It's a mark of how far gone Castiel must be that he does not react to this declaration with his customary shock to be told a nice thing, but instead gives Dean a vague, almost dismissive look.  
  
"You can give me that dirty look until your face freezes that way; I don't really care." Dean takes Castiel's bloody wrists into his hands, feeling the torn skin where metal restraints had held Castiel down, and Dean wants to cry and scream and send god straight to hell for having just sat by idly while one of his c _hildren_ was put through horrible, scary things, completely alone. "Let's go."  
  
He tries to pull Castiel out, but the angel has dug his feet in. Pulling at him is like trying to move a truck with his teeth.  
  
"Dammit, Cas, come on!" Dean gets between Cas and the wall Cas is staring at while breathing heavily, knowing that behind that wall sits the chair where Naomi did all her cutesy, ripping apart experiments with Cas' head. "Whatever she did to you, it's over! We can go!"  
  
Castiel startles like he's been shot, his pupils blown wide. There's blood crusting in the corner of one of his eyes, blood he can't wipe away because Dean is holding both of his hands.  
  
"Dean, I can't. I am not allowed to—"  
  
"That's her order, not mine! And she's dead! Are you going to let a dead woman stop me from saving you?"  
  
Castiel looks like he's about to cry, his eyes darting to every corner of the room that's held him prisoner for the past month. "I'm not allowed to _leave_. I have tried to leave, and I _can't_."  
  
Dean grabs his face with both hands, makes Cas look him dead in the eye. "Cas!" he snaps, then slows his voice to emphasize, firmly, "you are allowed to _leave_."  
  
Cas eyes dart back and forth, jumping now from Dean's left eye to his right and then down to the floor. "You're foolish. You don't know what of her commands are lying dormant in me now. I do not even know myself! All I can do is stay here, where I am not a threat to you or to anyone else!"  
  
"Oh, what, like you did in Purgatory?" Dean grabs Castiel's shoulders and yanks back, but there is still no give. Castiel is a marble statue, aggravatingly warm despite the fact. "Cas!" Dean yanks at him again, even harder. "You'd better let me help you! I am done losing you to stupid crap!" He tugs and tugs, even tries to move him by pulling at his hair. Castiel won't budge.  
  
"What do I have to do to get you out of here?!" Dean snaps, losing his patience. "'Cause I will dig out the floor around your feet and carry both you and it, so help me god!"  
  
Castiel's eyes are alarmingly blank, his tone flat when he says, "I don't believe god wants anything to do with me."  
  
Dean makes a yelling noise that doesn't quite make it to speech. He sputters, spins around, and crushes his forehead with his palms. Unbearable pain is swarming in his gut, and he can't — he just _can't_ leave Cas here, not in this room full of bladed instruments atop pristine surfaces and divine wrath dressed up to look cuddly.  
  
"Why can't people stay with me when I ask them to!?" The shout is like an outward punch, curling around and then ejected from Dean's very pores. He turns, shaky, to find Castiel staring at him with wide eyes. "This isn't just about you, Cas!" His voice is shattered, shifting too much for him to control it. "Maybe it's selfish, but I'm never going to find a better friend than you, and I do not have what it takes to look for anything even close. I _need_ you." He touches Castiel's wrists again, this time with painful lightness, looking right into Castiel's gaze. "And I think you need me, too, and that's _not_ a bad thing!" He tugs. "Now, move! Please!"  
  
Castiel stares into him like he's the Rosetta stone when first revealed, something unique and precious but currently indecipherable. When Dean feels him slacken and move into Dean's hands, they both heave out giant exhales.  
  
"That's good, Cas, that's good." Walking backwards, Dean takes Cas to the open door, one slow, dragging step at a time. Castiel's eyes never leave Dean's own, and in the hands Castiel has clasped tightly around Dean's forearms, he can feel Castiel's inner struggle to keep moving at all. "Keep going. That's it. We're almost there. You're doing awesome, that's good. Come on, Cas. Look at me. No, no, stop, don't look at the chair. I'll walk you around it. Trust me, Cas, okay? Trust me. Come _on_."  
  
They get out, and the second they step over the threshold, Castiel's shoulders fold inwards, his eyes fluttering shut in a combination of pain and relief.  
  
"Dean," he gasps, sounding absolutely terrified. No doubt, Naomi's mind control business is still pulling at him. "I want to go back."  
  
"I know, I know you do." Dean keeps pulling him into a slow, unsteady walk. "But... you need to take me home, and you need to _stay_ with me to make sure I don't do anything reckless once I'm there. Right?"  
  
It's an obvious struggle for Castiel to lift his eyes to Dean's face. "What... reckless thing are you planning?"  
  
"Dunno." Dean keeps tugging, moving further down the white, blank halls surrounding Castiel's prison cell. "But you have to stop me, 'cause it's gonna be bad. You're gonna stop me, right, Cas?"  
  
Castiel hisses through his teeth, a wince of absolute pain threading through his expression. "Yes." He can't seem to speak any more, until finally he grits out, "Dean, I... I think I need you, too."  
  
Dean laughs, though it's crazy to do so. They're hardly out of the frying pan yet, at least another hundred steps until they get to the zone where it's safe to fly in and out, and even then he's got to find some way to get through the control on Cas enough to get Cas to fly them _out_ , but he'll take it one step at a time, no matter how patiently he has to do it.  
  
"We're good for each other, man, I don't even know how I got lucky enough to get pulled out of Hell by the smartest son of a bitch Heaven even has. I mean, imagine if some other angel had gotten to me. Like _Uriel_."  
  
Castiel's face had been darkening up until that last word, and he huffs out an amused breath, though his face is still distraught. Still, even on a good day that's sometimes as close to a laugh as Cas will get, so Dean counts that single breath as a win.  
  
Cas exhales again, though in pain this time. A glimmer of frustration is in his eyes. "I have never walked this slowly before."  
  
Dean shrugs, his hands both clutching Castiel's elbows tightly as Castiel does the same to his. "Like I give a crap, as long as you keep going."  
  
Castiel nods, a deep breath accompanying the shutting of his eyes. He keeps them shut for the rest of the walk, just letting Dean guide him and blocking out everything else as Dean rambles on about senseless things that don't matter, offering Castiel a polestar to come back to when he starts to drift away.  
  
When they reach the safe point, finally, Dean leans in and wraps both arms around Castiel, allowing himself to be the gravity that ties Castiel's skin to its orbit around his Heavenly grace.  
  
"We're... going home?" Castiel fights to ask, and Dean nods against his neck.  
  
"Impala's got a homing beacon in it. Sam's praying to you there. Focus on that."  
  
"If I couldn't do that, you'd be stuck here indefinitely." In Castiel's soft voice is a question, even as he turns his head to listen across the cosmos or whatever freaky vibrations he needs to detect to use angel radio. "Retrieving me from this place was a risk."  
  
"Yeah, well," Dean shrugs, "the second Naomi tried to kill me, I knew I'd be okay. That's the last thing you'd ever tolerate someone doing to me."  
  
"You place an awful lot of faith in me." Castiel's gaze sharpens, just slightly, and he says, "I've found Sam."  
  
"You've more than earned my faith, Cas." Still wrapped around Castiel's body, Dean tenses in preparation for the lurching distortion of angel flight. They've got a long way to go, starting with keeping Cas contained and safe somehow until they can figure out how to heal the damage Naomi inflicted on him, but as long as he's still here, Dean knows they have a chance.  
  
Castiel's hand, light and shaking, lands on the back of Dean's head and holds him close. Dean doesn't know who he's trying to comfort: Dean, or himself, or maybe both of them.  
  
Talking seems to have become too much for Castiel, so Dean rubs a hand across Castiel's back, soothing out the stress building in his spine. "We saved you a burger at home," he says, and though he's trying to keep his tone conversational, he thinks the tension in his body might give away the last, lingering fear that Castiel might not actually leave, no matter how close he is to doing so. "If we don't get back to it soon, it's gonna get cold."  
  
Castiel hums, a deep resonance that vibrates through Dean's shoulders. "We wouldn't want that," he mutters, and digs his chin into Dean's shoulder. There's a tingling on his skin, energy building up from deep within.  
  
A second later, they're flying, arms folded tight and hearts beating fast.  
  
Castiel, at the hands of Dean Winchester, has been saved.

.

  
2013.02.26

[.](https://dustlines.livejournal.com/8548.html)


End file.
